Thursday, August 18, 2011

“North Star,
Star of the sea
I wish for a ship
Named after me
To sail for a day
Alone and free
With someone nice
For company.”

With her little brother giggling,

she launches the paper boats

across the pond,

fire blooming from their center

until they disappear

around the willow branches.

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Growing up, there were many oriental traditional that came to be my own. I always give a new bride a bell to hang in her kitchen (so she can ring it when she's lonely and know that her family hears her, still). I always eat the fortune from my cookie so it will come true. And, I used to always launch wish boats on the Willamette River on the eve of Chinese New Year.

The poem that's quoted here is from The Maggie B by Irene Haas.

I first read this as a small girl, when reading was my escape from a rough and tumble world. I often long for the simplicity of those times, the long hours spent alone with only my thoughts and Moby Dick or Watership Down for company.

This Flash Fiction, as most of the good ones, leans heavily on my own story. G-Man would love it if you'd play along by writing a story in exactly 55 words. The Noir, the merrier...

Charming 55! And I am excited to know you send out those little boats into the Willamette on Chinese New Year. Have you visited the Chinese Gardens in downtown Portland? It's a lovely place, which reminds me that my husband and I should go there again...it's been years.

I love these traditions you've described here. I've seen the paper boats bearing lights launched at night once and it is stunning. I love the idea of giving a bell to a new bride, but it saddens me that she has to ring a bell in order to be heard.